Stokes County

Moratoriums and bans

1. July 13, 2026 Stokes County: Moratorium proposed, rejected. Planning board recommended a six-month moratorium 6-1; commissioners instead adopted rules allowing data centers in conditional heavy-manufacturing districts. (Southern Coalition for Social Justice (party to the lawsuit), July 24, 2026)

Updates, newest first

1. Sept. 14, 2026 Project Delta · Commissioners again voted 3-2 to rezone the site after a Sept. 8 hearing and a 5-2 planning board recommendation to deny. (WUNC, Sept. 14, 2026; Southern Environmental Law Center (party to the lawsuit), Sept. 16, 2026)
2. Sept. 3, 2026 Project Delta · SELC, a party to the lawsuit, released an economist's analysis it commissioned that projects far less local tax revenue than the developer has claimed. (Southern Environmental Law Center (party to the lawsuit), Sept. 3, 2026)
3. Aug. 2026 Project Delta · A court consent order voided the January rezoning and set procedures for a new hearing; the developer had resubmitted its application in July. (Southern Environmental Law Center (party to the lawsuit), Sept. 16, 2026; Southern Coalition for Social Justice (party to the lawsuit), July 24, 2026)
4. July 13, 2026 Project Delta · Commissioners adopted amendments allowing data centers in heavy-manufacturing conditional zoning districts countywide, after the planning board recommended a six-month moratorium. (Southern Coalition for Social Justice (party to the lawsuit), July 24, 2026)
5. July 13, 2026 Stokes County: Moratorium proposed, rejected · Planning board recommended a six-month moratorium 6-1; commissioners instead adopted rules allowing data centers in conditional heavy-manufacturing districts. (Southern Coalition for Social Justice (party to the lawsuit), July 24, 2026)
6. March 12, 2026 Project Delta · Community groups and residents sued over the rezoning and a countywide data center text amendment. (Southern Coalition for Social Justice (party to the lawsuit), July 24, 2026)
7. Jan. 12, 2026 Project Delta · Commissioners voted 3-2 to rezone about 1,800 acres for Project Delta, against the planning board's recommendation; the developer said about 998 acres would be built on, and state regulators said no environmental permits had been sought yet. (Spectrum News 1, Jan. 12, 2026)

Statewide

G.S. 105-164.13(55a) exempts from state sales and use tax the electricity and support equipment (power, cooling, servers, networking) for a qualifying datacenter: one where the Commerce Secretary finds at least $75 million will be invested within five years and that meets a wage standard for its area and provides health insurance to its full-time employees; the older (55) exemption covers eligible internet datacenters investing $250 million in lower-tier counties. (North Carolina General Assembly, Oct. 20, 2026; North Carolina General Assembly, Oct. 20, 2026) Senate Bill 730, the Ratepayer Protection Act, was rewritten in the House to require utilities to contract with large data centers so they cover the cost of serving them; the House passed it 69-44 on June 3, 2026, and the Senate sent it to its Rules Committee on June 8 with no further action recorded. (North Carolina General Assembly, Oct. 20, 2026; Carolina Journal, June 4, 2026) Duke Energy reached a settlement in October 2026 in its rate cases (NCUC dockets E-7 Sub 1329 and E-2 Sub 1380) making an existing tariff mandatory for data centers and other customers that use large amounts of power nearly all the time, with upfront payment for dedicated facilities such as substations; it would not apply to contracts signed on or before June 1, 2026 and needs Utilities Commission approval. (WUNC / WFAE, Oct. 7, 2026; WUNC / WFAE, Oct. 14, 2026) Local moratoriums rest on G.S. 160D-107; Orange County cited it, and a Superior Court judge ruled in September 2026 that Chatham County's moratorium could not halt a project already under way. (Orange County, N.C., April 21, 2026; NC Newsline, Sept. 22, 2026) North Carolina data centers →